Spatial & Temporal Mapping of the Human Microbiome

One gram of your stool contains genomic data that would take over a ton of DVDs to contain, making microbiology the ultimate Big Data science. The human microbiome contains millions of genes, outnumbering the genes in the human genome by a factor of 100 or more, and advances in DNA sequencing technology and algorithms to interpret the data are revolutionizing our understanding of microbiomes on scales ranging from our bodies to our planets. In this talk I describe how we use evolution and computation to understand vast numbers of microbial community samples, understand how microbiomes change over a lifetime, over the body, and during health and disease, and explain how you can claim a place for yourself on the microbial map.

Rob Knight is a Professor in the Department of Pediatrics, with an additional appointment in the Department of Computer Science, at the University of California San Diego. He was chosen as one of 50 HHMI Early Career Scientists in 2009, is a Senior Editor at the ISME Journal, a member of the Steering Committee of the Earth Microbiome Project, and a co-founder of the American Gut Project.